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Ethics and Morality
On Chivalry...
Is chivalry dead? Should it be? What do you think?
Posted January 22, 2015
Is chivalry dead? Should it be? What do you think?
The RMS Titanic sank in 1912 off the coast of Newfoundland. Of the 2,223 passengers and crew, 1,517 were lost: 68 percent. Captain Smith gave the order for the lifeboats: “Women and children first.” So 70 percent of the women and children were saved but only 20 percent of the men, some of them the most wealthy and powerful men in Europe and North America. Put another way, about 80 percent of the men gave their lives so that 70 percent of the women and children could live. (Some, no doubt, were killed on or soon after the impact, so the percentage of beneficiaries and altruists are approximate).
On the day after the disaster, the Prime Minister, H.H. Asquith, declared in the House of Commons: ”our sense of admiration that the best traditions of the sea seemed to have been observed in the willing sacrifices which were offered to give the first chance of safety to those who were least able to help themselves.”
Note that 1912 was at the height of the allegedly oppressive patriarchy, before women had the vote in both the U.S. and the U.K. Surely this patriarchy was protective of women and children, rather than oppressive. Men saved women’s lives at the cost of their own. Chivalry. And the much maligned patriarchy still does, sometimes, as the Bravery Awards illustrate.
Similarly in 1852, HMS Birkenhead, carrying troops and families, struck a rock and sank off the coast of South Africa. This was the first time that the order was given: “Women and children first.” They were sent off in the few functional lifeboats and only 193 of the estimated complement of 643 were saved. This principle became known as the Birkenhead drill.
Coincidentally today’s paper reported a fire on a ferry, the Norman Atlantic, off the Albanian coast. A woman who was rescued with her two year old daughter stated: “They called first on women and children to be evacuated from the ship.” At this time only 190 of the 478 passengers and crew had been rescued (Globe and Mail 29 Dec 2014).
In contrast, the SS Costa Concordia grounded off the Italian coast in January 2012 with the loss of 32 lives. The contrasts between these maritime disasters are interesting. No order was given “Women and children first” so by default it was “Every man for himself” – or woman or child; so some members of the crew apparently shoved passengers aside to get into the lifeboats, and the Captain explained that he accidentally fell overboard into a lifeboat long before the last of the passengers had left. A Coast Guard Captain could be heard swearing at him to get back on board. Four crew members and one company employee were later found guilty of various offences and the Captain was charged with manslaughter, abandoning ship, and other offences. It was a mess. Apart from anything else, like the original course deviation, the later mistake by the helmsman turning the wrong way, the possibly distracting presence of a Moldavian dancer on the bridge, the failure to order and supervise the lifeboat launches, the delay in informing the civil authorities of the grounding… apart from all that, no chivalry.
What do you think? Should men privilege women and children? Why? Should not everyone’s first priority be self-preservation? Why should a man (or a woman) sacrifice his life (in these examples) to save others? When we discussed these fraught issues, one of my female students remarked “Heroes are zeroes.” Not much credit for altruism, chivalry or self-sacrifice there. (Don’t give up your life to save hers. It will not be appreciated! You are a zero.)
But chivalry is not just about women and children; it is also about, as Asquith put it, “those who were least able to help themselves.” i.e. the weakest.
We have two options: Social Darwinism or Egalitarianism, competition or compassion, might is right or human rights. Do we side with Darwin, the Republicans, Nietzsche and the ethics of power, and the prime value of freedom? Or the Enlightenment, Democrats, the Judeo-Christian ethics of love, and the prime value of equality? Costa Concordia or the Birkenhead, the Titanic, and the Norman Atlantic? Do we support every man for himself? The weakest go to the wall? The survival of the fittest? Or chivalry and the survival of the weakest? This includes civilization as we know it with the New Deal, the Welfare State, universal health care, maternity leave, etc. all dating back in spirit to the Elizabethan Poor Law of 1601.
Chivalry and good manners require, or used to require, that men demonstrate their respect for women by a list of behaviours, based on an assumption. In the immortal words of Vogue’s Book of Etiquette: (yes, 1948):
The whole relation of men to women, as far as etiquette is concerned, is based on the assumption that woman is a delicate, sensitive creature, easily tired, who must be feted, amused and protected, to whom the bright and gay side of the picture must always be turned. This is what causes men to hide the check at restaurants, to walk on the outer or seamy side of the sidewalk, to get up and give women their seats in busses and subways (Fenwick, 1948:28).
The alert reader may have realised that this assumption is no longer valid. Still, the list was long. The man
- “opens the door for her…”
- “allows a woman to precede him…”
- “carries packages and suitcases…”
- “lifts his hat in passing salutation…”
- “holds the umbrella over a woman…”
- “helps a woman to take off her coat…”
- “pulls out her chair for her…”
And so much more. Nostalgia for 1948 anyone? Similar points were made by Abigail Vanderbilt on the “social graces” of gentlemen (1958:183-90). An excellent article in The Atlantic by Emily Smith discusses some efforts to revive this old world, while others condemn chivalry as “benevolent sexism,” which seems like an oxymoron to me. Sexism is bad and benevolence is good. But benevolence which only privileges women with the values of “Ladies first” or “Women and children first,” is a little more (actually a lot more) controversial. This angelization, romanticization and pedestalization of women is rejected by some as idealization. Equity theorists might (ought to?) demand an equal 50/50 division between men and women and children on the lifeboats. Right? The comments on Smith’s article (and on my old post on misandry in PT 6 Oct 2010) illustrate the controversies clearly.
The Vogue tradition of chivalry is also controversial and may be obsolete. One male friend says he was punched in the face by a woman for whom he opened the door. He added that he did not punch her back. (If he had, would that have been a) self defense, b) egalitarian, or c) totally unacceptable?) Perhaps she thought he was being misogynistic as to a weaker being rather than demonstrating conventional good manners and privileging women. Was she right? And would she have refused her rightful place in the lifeboat? (We now know that women are not only physically stronger: they live longer than men, on average; they are also emotionally stronger: they have lower suicide rates. So what about those lifeboats?)
In contrast I recently gestured to a woman to precede me from an elevator. She smiled and remarked that “Chivalry is not dead.” I felt appreciated and perhaps she did too.
In contrast again, I have begun to see a role reversal. On two occasions last year, standing in the London Tube, women have offered me their seats – both of them young Asian women. The white male friend of one glowered! Very sweet and chivalrous, but it does make one feel old. Oh yes, and weaker too.
But in further contrast: I was leaving the university the other day (which is what inspired this meditation) and as I opened the inner door to exit, I noticed a young woman opening her outer door to enter. I held my door for her, but she held her door for me. Impasse. Then she moved to stand behind her door and waved me on. She won. As I thanked her she smiled into my eyes and said: “It’s a whole new world!”
PS. For further discussion, see Benet Davetian, Civility. A Cultural History (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2009) and Wikipedia, of course. Basic works would include Andreas Capellanus, The Art of Courtly Love (1184-6?), Chaucer, The Canterbury Tales (1385-1400), and Thomas Malory, Le Morte d’Arthur (pub 1485).
Fenwick, Millicent, 1948. Vogue’s Book of Etiquette. New York: Simon and Schuster.
Smith, Emily Esfahani, 2012. “Let’s Give Chivalry Another Chance.” The Atlantic. 10 Dec.
Vanderbilt, Amy 1958 [1952] Amy Vanderbilt’s Complete Book of Etiquette. New York: Doubleday.
